Environmental Education
Lee County Parks and Recreation staff provides recreational and educational programs and experiences for Lee County residents and visitors that heighten understandings and awareness of the unique and fragile ecosystems in Southwest Florida, in turn developing a caring relationship with the natural environment and fostering active participation in stewardship of these natural areas.
This is accomplished in many specific ways.
- For Lee County Parks & Recreation:
Promotes Lee County parks and preserves as ecotourism travel destinations for the express purpose of providing "knowledge and understanding of Lee County's unique environmental and cultural heritage" under Goal 61 of the "Lee Plan." - For visitors & tourists:
Provides avenues to learn about and experience first hand, the rich eco-heritage that makes "the Lee Island Coast unlike any other Florida destination." - For residents:
Preserves the natural resource base within Lee County in order to maintain a high quality of life. Provides meaningful programs and experiences to help residents make environmentally responsible decisions in their daily lives. - For the local economy:
Positions Lee County as a leader in the tourism industry by providing a healthy, friendly, and hospitable visitor destination to ensure the continuation and expansion of the area's domestic and international development program. - For the environment:
Protects, maintains and enhances "native habitats, floral and faunal species diversity, water quality, and natural surface water characteristics" under Goal 77 of the "Lee Plan", by managing visitors in the county's wetland and upland ecosystems and by informing and educating the public of environmental concerns and stewardship practices.
Environmental education goals are spelled out so as to help achieve results:
- Goal 1 - Programs will be integrated, complementary, and use a focused, sequential, cumulative approach with specific learning outcomes in mind.
- Goal 2 - Programs will allow participants to understand how the ecological systems of the earth function, how we are personally tied to those systems in our lives, and how we can make individual and collective changes in order to lessen our impact upon those systems.
- Goal 3 - Programs will focus on ecological processes, and emphasize major ecological concepts, not individual pieces of the environment.
- Goal 4 - Programs will foster positive feelings for the natural world by providing participants with a sense of wonder, and rich first hand contacts, to instill a deep and abiding emotional attachment to the earth and its life.
- Goal 5 - Programs will help incorporate "ecological feelings" in the daily routines of living and learning and help participants craft more ecological harmonious lifestyles.
- Goal 6 - Programs will appeal to people of a variety of ages and races, and from different demographic areas.
Community partners are key to environmental education at Lee County Parks and Recreation.
Almost all of the programs are designed and implemented by incorporating community partnerships. Some of these groups include: Lee District Schools, Florida Gulf Coast University, local home school organizations, Audubon of Southwest Florida, Calusa Group of Sierra Club, Charlotte Harbor National Estuary Program, Rookery Bay National Estuary Reserve, The Society for Ethical Ecotourism in Southwest Florida, Lee County Visitor and Convention Bureau, local chambers of commerce, local home-owners’ associations, Unitarian Universalist Church, Cape Coral Friends of Wildlife, Florida Department of Environmental Protection, Florida State Parks, Girl Scouts of Gulfcoast Florida, Cocoloba Chapter of the Florida Native Plant Society, and Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary.
Environmental education is promoted in a meaningful way.
Lee County's regional parks, preserves, and community recreational facilities provide ideal locations for programs to help visitors and residents develop an understanding of and relationship with the natural world. By providing meaningful programs, the agency helps visitors and residents develop a caring relationship with the natural environment so they in turn are willing to make environmentally responsible decisions in their lives.
Most programs/events are evaluated by number of participants, comment cards, evaluation forms, and donations made. The Environmental Education Program Coordinator provides these evaluation tools for participants to respond.